Thanksgiving weekend turned out to be a big time for grouse. We saw one in the crabapple tree again. We got a particularly close look at one in a berry bush (I think it’s burning bush, or barberry, or something with small red berries that aren’t edible by people) just off the front porch — it’s just to the right of the vertical post of the porch railing. That’s Charley’s car beyond it, with a red squirrel building a nest on the motor.
and two less satisfactory but wilder sightings. Anne thinks she saw one when we were walking at Poland Springs. The rest of us didn’t see it, and she only got a glimpse. Arlene flushed one while we were cutting more trails on Sunday.
The one by the front porch was close enough to observe in detail, if not cooperative enough to get a good picture. Looking at it through binoculars, I could see a ring of feathers around the neck, almost like a feather collar. I thought that was probably how it got its name.
There was one more grouse in the picture over the weekend. At the Aububon society’s Gilsland sanctuary near Portland there’s a mounted grouse hanging on the wall.